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Schmieheim

Baden-Württemberg, Germany48°17' N, 07°52'
E

Introduction

A rich
Jewish heritage once existed near
the Rhine River border with France in
the southern
Ortenau kreis
(Ortenau District) of
Baden-Württemberg (a state of the
Federal Republic of Germany).
Schmieheim
was one of several Jewish
Kehila in Baden
(as the region was known until after
WWII) which lay on the edge
of the Black
Forest. Schmieheim,
with its back to the mountains is the
farthest to the east of all of
these Jewish villages andlocated
about 30 kmnorth ofFreiburg and40 kilometers southeast ofStrasbourg.Schmieheim
and the other Jewish Kehila
here were small and as a result shared
their resources including the kosher
butchers, Jewish schools, and the
cemetery. The Jews of the Kehila
also frequently intermarried. TodaySchmieheim belongs to themunicipality of Kippenheim.

The first
documentation of Jews in Schmieheim was in
1624. Jews numbered 80 by
1747. In 1812, a
new synagogue was built in Schmieheim and
in 1827, it became the seat of the
district rabbinate. A Jewish
elementary school was opened in the 1830s,
numbering 120 students in 1855.

Perhaps one of the most famous former
residents of Schmieheim, the
philanthropist Isaac
Wolfe Bernheim, wrote in his 1910
Book, The Bernheim Family,
that his great grandfather, Loeb, "emigrated
during the middle part of the Eighteenth
Century from Switzerland to Schmieheim,
a small village in the Southern part of
the Grand Duchy of Baden, and it is in
that poor but hospitable village that
the writer of this history first saw the
light of day." Today, prominent
demographers of Jews in that period
believe large numbers of Jews came from
Alsatian territory across the Rhine River.
For example, see discussions on origins of
Southwest German Jews in Alice Dreifuss
Goldstein's 2008 book, Ordinary
People, Turbulent Times (see Books).

By the 19th century Schmieheim had become a
major center of
Judaism with a Jewish population of nearly
50%. In 1861, the
Jews of Baden were granted full liberties
by the Grand Duke Frederick of Baden and
allowed to vote and hold office in their
communities. Although many Jews moved from
Schmieheim to nearby larger cities like
Lahr, Offenburg and Karlsruhe, in 1875, 486 out of
a total of 1,740 residents of Schmieheim
were Jewish. Its last
district rabbi was the Reform-minded Dr.
Viktor Meyer Rawisc, who translated part
of the Talmud into German and transferred
the district rabbinate to Offenburg in
1893. At the
beginning of the 20th century Jews
continued to trade in cattle and opened a
number of factories (cigarettes, liquor,
metal screening). But
the younger Jews had been able to acquire
higher education and were rapidly leaving
the village. In 1933, only 121 Jews
remained. Alice Dreifuss Goldstein
writing about Altdorf, described a
situation common in the area,

" Altdorf
was a growing town in the
middle of the nineteenth
century, but it certainly
could not have supported all
the offspring of the prolific
Jewish Families -- or of the
families of their Catholic
fellow townspeople. The
Catholics could remain in the
area by expanding land under
cultivation or for use as
grazing grounds. New
crops, like tobacco were
introduced, which further
expanded opportunities for the
growing population. But
Jews could not own land and
could not turn to similar
solutions. Out-migration
thus became a useful solution
for the Jews. They had
connections in many other
places in the region, both
family and business; many had
also had experiences out of
Altdorf, because they had
often been sent away to serve
as apprentices or to otherwise
further their education.
There was little to keep them
in Altdorf or to lure them
back once they had been to the
region's cities."

On Kristallnacht
(9-10 November 1938), the synagogue and
Jewish homes were heavily
damaged,and at the cemetery
buildings were destroyed and graves were
overturned. Twenty eight men were
taken away to the Dachau concentration
camp. Shortly
after most of the other residents left
Schieheim. In all, 32
emigrated while 61 moved to other German
cities. On October 22, 1940, 20 of the
former Jewish Schmieheim emigres along with 14
directly from Schmieheim (see Gunther
Karger story) were deported to the
Gurs concentration camp. Half of
them perished in Auschwitz. Altogether 44
Jews from Schmieheim died in the
camps.

Hanna
Baumann was the last Jewish
person born in Schmieheim
(1934) and a playmate of Gunther Karger. Her family
left Schmieheim hoping to
escape being deported to
concentration camps and
killed. The train they
were on was stopped, the
Jews aboard were murdered
including 5 year old
Hanna and her parents.
The people of Schmieheim
dedicated the new
kindergarten school naming
it “The Hanna Baumann
Kindergarten” in her memory.

Photo courtesy of
Gunter Karger

This page is dedicated to Schmieheim and
its former Jewish community. We celebrate
the lives of all
Jews who
lived in Schmieheim and remember
those who died in the Holocaust.
Please continue on to
any of several additional
pages about Schmieheim
shown on the green banner across the top
of the page.

If you share an interest in Schmieheim, we
would be happy to include on
these pages any memoirs, historical
material, photos, maps, etc. Please
drop
me a line.

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